KUALA LUMPUR: The FBM KLCI looks set to snap a seven-day losing streak on Monday, days ahead of the announcement of the national budget.

Regional markets remained firm as they tracked yet another record close on Wall Street on Friday.

Japan's Nikkei rose to its highest since 1996 in intraday trade following Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's decisive win in the national elections held over the weekend, Reuters reported.

At 12.30pm, the FBM KLCI was up 2.86 points to 1,743.51 points. Turnover was 1.63 billion shares with a value of RM818.77mil. There were 300 advancers to 288 decliners with 514 counters unchanged.

Axiata helped pull the index higher in morning trade, gaining six sen to RM5.22. In other telcos, Maxis rose three sen to RM5.74, Digi climbed six sen to RM4.88 and Telekom Malaysia added three sen to RM6.15.

Petronas Gas also helped lift the KLCI, rising 18 sen to RM18.06, while Petronas Chemicals was unchanged at RM7.54 and Petronas Dagangan was untraded. 

Banking stocks were mostly higher with CIMB putting on one sen to RM6.20, RHB adding two sen to RM5, Hong Leong Bank adding two sen to RM16.02 and Ambank gaining one sen to RM4.38. Maybank, however, lost one sen to RM9.28 and Public Bank was unchanged at RM20.46.

Plantations player PPB Group added 12 sen to RM16.66 while Sime Darby rose seven sen to RM9.13. IOI declined three sen to RM4.43 and KL Kepong shaved off 20 sen to RM24.26.

On the wider market, Notion VTec was in the spotlight following Friday's news that a fire had broken out at its main manufacturing plant in Klang, halting operations. Notion's share price plummeted 26 sen or 27% to 70 sen before trading in the counter was suspended.

Trading resumed at 10am on Monday, and the share regained four sen to 74 sen as investors processed an update issued by the company.

Other gainers on the market included Mikro MSC, which rose 3.5 sen to 53 sen and Inta Bina Group, which gained two sen to 33.5 sen.

Laggards included Genting Plantations, which dropped 12 sen to RM10.56. Sern Kou Resources slipped seven sen to RM1.23 while Jaks Resources fell seven sen to RM1.40.

Oil prices rose on Monday amid supply concerns in the Middle East and tightening supply in the US market even as demand in Asia continues to rise, Reuters reported.

US light crude rose 25 cents to US$52.09 while Brent Crude gained 13 cents to US$57.88

On the forex market, the ringgit fell 0.2% against the greenback at 4.2335, 0.7% against the pound sterling at 5.5881 and 0.02% against the Singapore dollar at 3.1079.